Family House Hongdae — Hotel in Seoul

The hotel is a split hotel/hostel depending on what you selected. I had a 3 bedroom family room that I booked for myself, but saw inside one of the hostel parts with the bunk beds as well.|||| First it's fairly close to Hongik University Station (maybe around 10 min or so (give or take) depending on the person) on the Line 2 as well as it's a convenient stop for the AREX airport express train, plus it's also near the hot spot of Hongik University area for any late night drinks, dinners, night clubs as well which are a short walk as well away. Plus right down the road there is an actual Super Market and not a standard GS25 or 7-11 which had a lot more options for food if you wanted to cook in your room.|||| When I first arrived the door was locked and I couldn't get inside. It was later in the afternoon, but after arriving from my long trip, I didn't know what to do. Luckily they heard me knock on the glass and came down and let me it. |||| My room was a good size with 3 beds (one made for me and the other two not made as I was going to be the only one in the room), it had a kitchen with a sink and stove and I assume a washing machine/dryer? I couldn't figure it out and never did bother to ask how I used it (I should have as I needed to do laundry), so instructions in other languages would have been nice at least. They had a small table as well that had a hair dryer in it.|||| The bathroom was a bit strange from what I was expecting, having been to hotels around the world, this was a first for me. The bathroom is a 1 person sized room with a toilet and sink and a detachable shower head above the sink, which means the small room is also the shower as well as the toilet. That took a bit to get used to. The good news about it was there was toothpaste, shampoo and such there for your use.|||| The bed was very hard, so with all my walking each day, I did feel it was a little uncomfortable to sleep. Luckily with my discovery of Soju, those nights of drinking that, I didn't notice any discomfort. One thing too was there is a window above the sink which had a lot of light coming in. So I had to put a towel over it so that I could sleep which I had to keep up the entire stay.|||| TV was fully equipped with a lot of stations, hard to remember, but over 200, though a few were pay ones, but you wouldn't know unless you were watching something and it would cut out saying that it's a pay station after watching what I assume was a few mins of the current show. But before going out for the night, it was something good to have in the room to watch some shows and such.|||| The people were very nice and friendly and upstairs on the 3rd floor is the common area which is open until midnight (can't recall what time it opened up, but 6 or 7am?). Breakfast is in here between 8 and 11 and you can make use of the stove and they provide bread, eggs, noddles and such for the guests. Also there is a couch, free WiFi (that never cut out and was easy to access at all hours) and TV as well as a shower. This is the area where I saw the bunk bed room so it appears 3 of the doors in this common room lead to the hostel rooms part and this would be their TV and shower etc.|||| The key was a combination key on a keycard. The keycard was for the front door and the key for your room. I found the key very bulky though carrying it around with me for 16 or so hours each day in my pocket, but that could be the standard for those types of locks as I saw similar locks on places as I was roaming around the city.|||| So the price is great, the location is good and the hospitality is wonderful. A few drawbacks, but those are going to be more dependent on the comfort level of individuals. The place worked for me and my needs and was happy to save the money staying there and spending the savings doing other stuff...

The hostel is located a short walk away from Exit 2 of Hongik station with plenty of restaurants, bars and super-markets nearby. It's close to Hongdae's thriving nightlife with plenty of shops and entertainment. It's really convenient as a base as you can reach many other places easily. ||||The lady who hosts is super friendly and very kind. She's always happy to offer assistance and speaks English well. She even lets you store your suitcase in the garage if you arrive early or have a late flight on the day of checking out. She provides the address and phone number, as well as Kakao and Line ID before you check in too.||||We stayed in room 1 on the first floor. It's close to the street but the back street wasn't very busy whilst we were there. The rooms come with automatic lights and free toiletries. Ours had a small fridge and kitchen though no pots or pans were provided. The shower room had a toilet, sink, a shower head attachment and a free standing tap near the toilet. ||||The room size was okay for two people and the beds were comfortable. Aircon was provided as well as mosquito netting on the windows and we had a small hair dryer in the vanity mirror too. There was an extension cord to charge electronics, and USB ports in the tv and other appliances.||||The room was clean and breakfast was provided upstairs on the third floor. Usually there was an option of milk, bread, tea and coffee, fruit, yogurt and shincup ramyeon. It was all self-serve with a polite notice to kindly wash your own dishes. ||||The only downside to the room was the slightly tricky tv - we had satellite TV but many channels weren't available as they had to be paid for. And also the Wifi didn't always work that well though we rented a wifi egg from the airport.||||All in all it was a great place to stay for our trip. It was close enough to Hongdae that we could go walk around and relax, but also served as a great base whilst we were sight seeing as it was close to the station.||||There's a starbucks, a twosome place and Jass Coffee all nearby, as well as a gs25 and a smaller independent supermarket. There's a pizza shop and several BBQ places, as well as french bakery called...

can’t really figure out why the rating is so high honestly. To start with the good the emplacement is in fact great, the room is about what i would expect for something this cheap in a big city, a metal bunk bed with an okay mattress. The wifi runs smoothly and the ac works well. There is some basic breakfast ingredients you can use for free.you have your own outlet but since i was on the top bunk it was just an extension cord that was stuck between the mattress and bed frame and kept on falling on the floor which was annoying but i could deal with it. Where the real problem lies is the bathroom, it is one of those korean wet bathroom (where the whole bathroom is the shower) which is probably common in this type of place here even though it is quite impractical in a hostel (if someone just want to brush their teeth at the sink then you can’t shower or use the toilet) so that can be okay too. But it was just so so so dirty i think that they did clean everyday but it just wasn’t enough there was constantly hair everywhere, wet toilet paper, urine on the toilet seat, i even saw someone who didn’t flush their poop and also just LOTS of mold. Not everything can be blamed on the hostel some people are just very disrespectful and don’t cleanup after themselves but still i have never experienced that elsewhere. both the hand soap and shower gel ran out and never got replaced while i was there. I also talked to a girl that had to change hostel because her room was just incredibly stinky. I guess this was my lesson that in big cities if a place is cheap...